Talk:Appraise
Useful skill level Hmmm... being a fairly new player to NWN, I don't have a good sense of how many points I would need to invest in Appraise for it to have a useful impact (and, considering the 30% cap, how many points would be going overboard). Can anyone provide a generalization or estimate about the Appraise skills of merchants in the OC and Expansion Campaigns? How high do they go? Would a modified skill check of 5 be handy, or would I need to reach 15+ points before I get good savings? Would I regularly rub against the 30% cap if I had, say, 20+ points? p.s. I realize the general consensus is that Appraise isn't worth the points anyway due to the abundance of gold in Bioware's campaigns, but I am curious all the same. -Marco 172.165.109.47 23:40, 27 September 2006 (PDT) * Since Appraise was introduced with SoU, none of the merchants in the OC have any ranks in Appraise (but their intelligence is a factor). You'll start hitting the 30% cap at times with an Appraise of 21, and always hit the cap at about 40. Personally, I think a skill of 5 is enjoyable in the OC. That should give you a favorable reaction from at least one merchant in each chapter, but is not so high that a favorable reaction is guaranteed. (A skill of 10-12 would guarantee favorable reactions.) Don't forget that the OC was balanced before Appraise, and has not been rebalanced since. (This is most notable in chapter 3 with Barun -- it was intended that you not make a profit off of him, but you can with a high Appraise skill.) : :I haven't checked all the merchants in the expansions, but from the few I looked at, it appears the highest Appraise among the merchants is a 20 in SoU chapter 2. You can either go with a few ranks in Appraise to give you an advantage with the 0-Appraise merchants, or max the skill to compete with these uber-merchants. --The Krit 16:06, 29 September 2006 (PDT) * Something else that should go with the above: competing with the uber-merchants is really more for the thrill of getting feedback saying the reaction is "favorable" than for a significant change in gold. Unless you are hitting the cap, increasing the skill by 1 point will change prices by 1% of base, regardless of how the outcome is classified (favorable/neutral/unfavorable). The main difference between a merchant who sells at 300% with an appraise of 20 and one who sells at 320% with an appraise of 0 is that the former caps out at a lower price (minimum price being 300-30, as opposed to 320-30 for the latter), so it may be best to ignore the "unfavorable" feedback and just trust that your skill is working and/or do some comparison shopping to get a rough feel for how good the prices are. --The Krit 22:24, September 6, 2010 (UTC) Previous version I am removing the comment: "Taking advantage of easy marks can be problematic since casting these spells is considered a hostile act." as it is no longer true as these spells are non-hostile by script. However, I do recall that this was not always the case but can't remember which patch fixed it.WhiZard 01:55, April 7, 2010 (UTC) * Good question. I don't see it mentioned in the patch notes. Maybe 1.67? That might have been current about the time that someone pointed out to me that those spells were no longer hostile. (Of course, I obviously didn't think to update the wiki at the time.) Ooch. It looks like 1.67 came out within a month of me adding that line to the article. Murphy says it has to have been that patch. :) PS I tweaked the formatting of your quote. If you don't like it, please change it back. --The Krit 01:22, April 8, 2010 (UTC) Easy profit Should it be pointed out that, in the case of merchants who's selling and buying prices are relatively close to each other; that the player can actually make a profit buying goods from the merchant and then reselling them(potentially ad infinitum, if the merchant has infinite gold)? Or should the explanation regarding the price adjustments be enough to draw conclusions? Gelscressor 20:21, August 23, 2010 (UTC) * Sounds like a good reminder for builders. If it actually happens, it's basically a bug in the module, so I wouldn't get player's hopes up by mentioning it as a way to make a profit. --The Krit 23:25, August 23, 2010 (UTC)